January 26, 2012

Caves of Myrddin: Vithujin's Confusions

Vithujin the Elf, occasional survivor of the dangers under Dundagel, has returned once more to the guesthouse at the Abbey of St. Emmet. Once there, he immediately begins making arrangements for a celebration he calls the "Woed Ruckus", a week long marathon of drinking, feasting, and wenching. Reaching into the pouches at his belt, he pulls forth gold, and even platinum coins to pay the locals for their various services.

As a joke, Vithujin payed for some fliers to be made up. The intent was to send invitations over to the scoundrels at Le Lepin Bleu (Hugo le Bâtard's manor), but due to heavy drinking and gross overpayment the fliers end up in every settlement surrounding the Abbey.

Let the Woed Ruckus begin!

Our generous host Vithujin the Elf, the Pantless Pilgrim, the Demon Freezer, and only person to have successfully goosed the Dragon of Dundagel and been remortaled to talk about it; is throwing a party.

Already in attendance are those persons possessing a gentle spirit, quick wit, or firm backside.

Now the rest of you need to show up.

The plan is to fill the Abbey with songs, stories, and seductions for a full week.

St. Emmet's antennae will be flailing wildly.

On the first day of the Woad Ruckus, Vithujin refuses to talk about where he got all these gold and platinum coins that he is now spending so recklessly. On the second day, Vithujin lets slip only that the coins were indeed found under the ruins of Dundagel but remains tight-lipped about any details. That doesn't last for long though. After days of drinking and merrymaking, he seems to forget his caution and launches into a tale so impossible, so ridiculous, that those who've experienced the horrors of Dundagel think it might just be true.

It went something like this...

I don't know how this story makes any sense, but this is what happened. Those dungeons are mad I tell you. Best I can do is list out all the quandaries I encountered. A list of Vithujin's confusions. Here we go.

It was a dark and stormy morning when we set off to the dungeon. There were bunches of us, ten or eleven I think. Three elves for sure, Lankii, Sonoma, and myself. Our holy man, Ethelred the Unready. The great slab of beef named Will Die Too was there, and strong enough to wrestle ogres. Frederick the Dwarf brought his maps and his army along, some crossbowmen in chain, a mule, and Turg his goblin guide. Oh, and Sonoma has a torchbearer, but that guy didn't say much.

There was some talk of going back into the magical land of the goblins where day is night and the stars are all wrong. The burning sands of the desert are strong enough to keep the forest in bloom during winter. Turg knows of a village of strange colored men miles away who hold goblins as slaves. We decided to go meet these men, so down we went into the east tower, the gatehouse of Dundagel. As we came down the spiral stairs a swarm of giant rats suddenly fell upon us! We hacked and chopped them to bits, but one of them bit into the thigh of Frederick's animal trainer so hard that blood sprayed out like a fountain and I almost slipped and fell down the stairs. His wounds were too great, and the poor man perished while he mumbled something like "don't leave me down here". We loaded his corpse onto the mule and continued down.

Frederick led us through the winding corridors of stone and mortar until we reached the circular portal covered in runes and emerged in the goblin ghost town. The sky and trees and purple fruits are strange in ways I can't describe, but at least the weather was an improvement. Then, as soon as we arrived, we abandoned our plan to search out the strange colored men. Instead we took to exploring the various sections of the dungeon passages and rooms which straddle between that world and this one. We began opening new doors.

We found a small hole at the base of a wall in a stone room. Terg was sent in to investigate. Terg said that the tunnels were made by many rats, and lead to corridors further down. We plugged the hole as best we could.

We found a small room full of weapons, some were rusty junk but others we took to sell. We discovered later that among those a two handed battleaxe was magical, Will Die Too carries it now.

Then we found a hallway full of demonic faces carved into the stone walls. Sensing danger, Frederick the Dwarf searched about and found that the entire floor of the hallway was a pressure plate. We took the obvious course of action and tossed the corpse of our dead comrade onto the trap while quickly backing away. Poison darts shot out through some of the demon mouths along the walls. With the pressure plate thus weighted down, we walked across safely.

Soon we found ourselves in a satanic chapel. Others collected a wavy emerald eyed serpent dagger, emptied fresh blood from a small golden bowl, and took down the fine black curtains from the walls. I poured a vial of holy water unto a small statue of Old Scratch, utterly melting it. We learned later that these items allow the dagger to summon forth shadow demons when it spills the blood of the innocent. Ethelred, being a man of strong faith, insisted then that we destroy the dagger. I think that I saw Lankii keep it's emerald eyes though.

After the looting, we searched about for whoever had filled the blood bowl. Unable to find any doors, we went up through the hole in the ceiling and discovered a very strange room indeed. Along the walls were a dozen pillars made of crystal, prism prisons holding shadow demons in stasis. One of these disguised a secret door. There were three sets of finger holes in the stone next to one crystal pillar, but the lowermost set of holes were trapped to snip off fingers. The big brute Will Die Too stepped up and heaved at the upper finger holds. The entire column slowly swung out like a door, as all the air in the room rushed out the opening pushing us toward the void that lay beyond. Will let the column snap shut. We dallied here for a time as I sketched the pillars and shadowy figures within. We returned here (with our dead friend) and presented these findings to the scholars of the abbey. Thus we learned of the shadow demons and the dagger used to summon them for bargaining.

After a long rest, we set out again retracing our steps. Along the way, we encountered a gang of melty lepers. They didn't notice us approach, so I thought we were just going to toss holy water on them to see if they melted further. The holy water had no effect, so I thought we would try to parley. But no, one of us threw a burning flask of oil at them, which flew wide at lit up the room. Others in our group began aiming crossbows, so I cast a sleep spell on the freaks hoping to defuse the situation and possibly save their lives. Well, we tied them up and tried to question them, but the horrid things had never grown any tongues to speak with. That's when we saw their satanic tattoos. We decided they they were either evil abominations or victims of a fate worse than death. We put them down and continued on our way.

Rather than return to the hall of the shadow demons, we chose a new perfectly ordinary transdimensional dungeon corridor to explore. In this area, we found a large font with a statue of the White Queen (Morgana?) pouring a continuous stream of clean pure water from an urn. In a nearby room, we found a multitude of cats and a crazy old crone who claimed to be the "royal rat catcher" having inherited the job from her mother. If that's true then how old is she? Centuries? She was also talking to people who weren't there and pouring us drinks from her jug of piss, so we were a tad skeptical. Sensing that her answers were useless, we went back to rest once more and prepare new spells. We returned to her with gifts of jam and other foodstuffs to distract the old woman. Meanwhile, Ethelred the Unready recited prayers that allowed him to speak to the horde of cats. The first thing he heard them say was "Get us the hell away from that crazy woman! She makes us live in this dungeon!". Well, promises of freedom were made, and questions about shiny treasure were asked. Then a black cat with one white paw and the soul of an adventurer stepped forward and offered to lead us to the "big pile of shinnies behind the secret door". His name is Billy White Paw, and we owe this feast to him.

Billy led us up and down and around from room to room. He warned us of the flying serpents in one room. Lankii charmed one of these, I think he said it's a "wobra". Eventually Billy led us into a room with the bodies of a bunch of purple men, purple raiders I guess. In this room is a secret door that opens to a narrow natural cave passage. The passage soon widens into a cavern with a large pool of water holding about twenty large fanged fish. Oh, and in the center of the pool is a GIANT HEAPING PILE OF COINS AND GEMSTONES!

Well, those fish soon became kitty treats. Then we filled every sack and backpack and had the mule loaded down so badly that I heard him wheezing as he went up stairs. We brought all the cats out to the forest in the magical goblin lands and set them free. The old woman cried a bit, but we made them a deal and she can always get new cats. She is staying at the abbey for now, perhaps the priests have some prayers that can help unfuddle her. Billy White Paw has decided to continue traveling with us. Ethelred seems to have taken a shine to him. As we passed by the magical throne Ethelred told Billy that a dog once sat in the throne and learned to speak, but it sometimes melts people and is dangerous. Billy said "Not dangerous to me. I'M Billy White Paw!" and hoped up to sit in it. It didn't give him the gift of speech, but Billy claims that it "supered up his cattishness". I'm not sure what that means, but I'm glad that he's happy. Ethelred is using his share of the loot to research a new spell to help him understand Billy all the time, oh and he donated a bunch of gold to the abbey. I think he said something about it going to help build a new holy water font. But you know, I prefer ale. Lankii is busy training his new pet flying cobra. I still don't trust the venomous thing. It might last for months but that charm spell will wear off eventually, and that wobra keeps looking over at me. We buried our poor dead animal trainer, and Frederick is already hiring someone new. He also gives his men danger pay, and hefty bonuses. He even made an effort to track down the dead mans family in order to compensate them. I thought it was a classy move, especially for a guy who throws his dead henchmen unto traps.

And me? I'm just taking it one day at a time... and today was made for wenching!